Mistletoe Complications
by I Call Him Fred
Summary: It's Christmas Eve and Ron's setting the table, which is bad in itself, until an evil mistletoe complicates things further.


Ron Weasley decides, rather crossly, that his mother is out of her mind. It's Christmas Eve, and she has left him in charge of the flatware while she runs to buy another turkey, Fred and George having bewitched the last to perform the can-can on the table during breakfast. Everyone else is sleeping, or shopping, or hidden away upstairs while he suffers in the heavily decorated kitchen. The garlands looped from the ceiling kept brushing the top of his head in quite an irritating fashion, and one particularly long one wraps itself quite regularly around his neck. _Wonderful,_ he thinks, _k__illed by a Christmas garland. What a fine, noble way to die._

Ron finds all of this ridiculous. He hates setting the table, be it for three or for sixteen. The forks confuse him endlessly (who in the world needs anything more than a regular fork? And what, exactly, is the point of a _relish_ fork? ), the plates are absurdly slippery and seem to enjoy crashing to the floor, probably just to spite him.

"Stop that," he mutters as one particularly stubborn plate slides over the tablecloth, knocking into a wine glass that he'd painstakingly put in just the right position on the right of the place setting. He picks up the plate and looks at it sternly. His mother keeps them shiny and clean, and he can see a vague outline of his reflection glaring back at him, almost lost in the pattern of intertwining flowers. Ron can almost convince himself that that is not his own face, that the plate is staring back at him, and not with the somewhat pathetic expression Ron is fairly certain is on his own face, but one that is rather malevolent.

_"You're an idiot," _it seems to say, lips twisting in cruel amusement, _"don't even __try to understand. The world of cutlery is a dangerous place..."_

"Yeah, well," Ron says, not believing that he can't even think of a retort to insults made by a plate. He replaces it on the table with more force than necessary, and the plate _thunks_ and cracks down the middle.

Ron takes a deep breath.

He takes two more.

"Ron?"

He nearly jumps out of his skin and the plates cascade to the floor in a magnificent torrent. The resulting crash echoes through the house. He closes his eyes.

"Fantastic." He mutters to himself, "just-- great. Bloody brilliant." He stays still, listening to Hermione fixing the plates and setting them down on the table.

"Ron?" She asks again, fingers soft against his forearm, crossed over his chest.

"Wait a second," Ron says, eyes popping open in disbelief, "How did you finish that so fast?"

Hermione looks startled. "Setting the plates? That's easy. Why?"

Ron's forehead furrows so thoroughly that he imagines it looks as if his eyebrows are attacking each other. "I've been here for nearly an hour, and those bloody plates kept slipping and knocking the-- the forks and things. Plus Mum wants me to find a pastry fork-- what are those, even?"

Hermione snorts, but she's smiling when she says, "A pastry fork is like a mixture of a fork and a knife-- a tine on one side is thicker so you can use it to cut the desert when you're eating it." She straightens a knife with one hand, so that the blade is pointing inward, quickly, like she's been doing this all her life, and makes for the stairs, pulling Ron by the wrist after her. He's in awe. _I am best friends with a girl__ who knows about cutlery_, he thinks dazedly, adding _"Cutlery Queen"_ to his mental list of Hermione's accomplishments. The list is already long enough that, if written out, it would stretch to the moon and back.

Ron is following Hermione awkwardly, limbs askew, as she takes the stairs at a run. They are traveling so quickly that when they arrive at the landing in front of Percy's old room, which Harry now uses, Ron doesn't even notice the vaguely evil-looking mistletoe zooming about over their heads until it starts to sing.

"FA LA LA LA LA, LA LA LA LAAAAAAAAAAAA!!" it howls, showing sharp white fangs and beady black eyes.

"Oh, no," Ron grumbles, glaring at it.

Hermione moans, and looks decidedly over Ron's shoulder. "Maybe," she whispers, "if we ignore it..."

"It won't work," Ron says desperately, "Ginny was caught under that thing for _hours_ when we all were in Diagon Alley last week..."

Harry emerges from his room, looks knowingly at the mistletoe, and hurries down the stairs.

"Wait! Wait, Harry, this mistletoe is possessed..." Ron calls after him.

Harry only laughs, and continues down the stairs.

Ron and Hermione look at each other. They look at the mistletoe, which is merrily bawling "Silent Night", and pelting its white berries at the tops of their heads. They look at each other again.

"Well--" starts Ron hoarsely.

Hermione licks her lips. They avoid each others' eyes. Mistletoe bellowing "White Christmas" above them, they stand still for what seems like ages. Ron's brain is shrieking almost as loudly as the infernal plant.

_Do it,_ it tells him, _make your move. How long have you been wanting to? And here's your chance..._

Ron's so preoccupied listening to his brain verbally abuse him that he's taken totally off-guard when Hermione places her hands on either side of his face and pulls him down to her. They kiss hesitantly, with surprise (especially on Ron's part), quickly, and pull apart. They're both flushed and embarrassed, and yet it is with relief that they look at the now-quiet mistletoe.

"D'you think--" Ron says cautiously, but is cut off by Hermione pulling him farther up the stairs.

"We have to get away from it," she explains, "Bill and Fleur were too slow the other day and it made them do it again."

Ron thinks that _he_ wouldn't mind doing it again, but the look on Hermione's face stops him. Remembering that she wanted to show him something, he asks her about it, and to his immense surprise she colors and tells him it's nothing, just about House Elves, and he won't care anyways.

"Alright," he says bemusedly, turning to go back down the stairs. It occurs to him that she could have just lured him up there for the kiss, but his brain quickly dismisses that as ridiculous, and he continues back down the stairs to finish setting the table.


End file.
